Arsenal must rue losing “unbelievable” PL star who loved Henry

After two seasons of coming painfully close, there was hope and expectation that this year would finally be Arsenal’s year.

Unfortunately, that does not seem to be the case, as with over half of the campaign played, Mikel Arteta’s side are six points off Liverpool in the Premier League and out of both the League Cup and FA Cup.

Worse yet, with Gabriel Martinelli, Bukayo Saka, and Gabriel Jesus out injured, the team looks incredibly light in attack.

It’s just the situation which could have been alleviated by a former youth player who was let go for nothing but is now worth an enormous sum of money.

Former Arsenal youth players let go too soon

Before we get to the player in question, let’s look at a couple of other academy gems who were let go far too soon by Arsenal, starting with perhaps the most painful of the lot: Harry Kane.

The England captain was famously released by the Gunners when he was a child as they didn’t believe he had what was needed to make it in the game, which was a decision that came back to haunt the club in a big way.

After being picked up by Tottenham Hotspur a few years later, then spending a few years out on loan following his graduation from the youth academy, the Walthamstow-born poacher took his chance in the Lilywhites’ first team and never looked back.

In all, the 31-year-old scored 280 goals and provided 61 assists in 435 games for Spurs before securing a mega-money move to Bayern Munich in the summer of 2023, where he’s already racked up an incredible tally of 72 goals, and 22 assists in 73 games and looks on track to lift his first league title this season.

On top of going on to become arguably the greatest striker in world football, he also had a nasty habit of scoring against the Gunners, and as things stand, has a record of 15 goals and two assists in just 21 appearances against the red side of North London.

Interestingly, one of Kane’s teammates in Baveria is another player who left the Gunners too soon: Serge Gnabry.

The German international joined the club’s youth set-up in 2011, but after an unsuccessful loan to West Bromwich Albion, he was sold to Werder Bremen in 2016, where he played well enough to attract Bayern’s attention, where he has since scored 90 goals and provided 56 assists in 262 appearances.

With all that said, the player in question, who’s now worth a fortune, is plying his trade much closer to N5.

The former Arsenal prospect worth millions today

So, it would be fair to say that of all the players that Arsenal have let go too soon over the years, Kane ranks as the most painful, but while he’s now tearing it up in Germany, there is another former academy gem continuing to perform in South London.

Crystal Palace’s Eberechi Eze has cemented himself as one of the most exciting and dangerous players in the Premier League over the last few years, someone who can play off the left, in attacking midfield or even as a left eight, but years before he made a name for himself at Selhurst Park, he was in the Gunners’ academy.

The England international, who revealed that Thierry Henry was his “number one” player growing up, joined the North Londoners as a child but was released at just 13 years old in 2011, after which he would spend time with Fulham, Reading and Millwall, where he was again released.

He finally found a permanent home with Queens Park Rangers in the Championship. Then, four years later, he finally earned a move to the Premier League when Palace agreed to pay the Hoops £20m, including add-ons, following his impressive 19/20 campaign in which he scored 14 goals and provided eight assists in 48 games.

Since moving to the Eagles, the “unbelievable” Premier League star, as dubbed by Oliver Glasner, has gone from strength to strength, racking up a tally of 32 goals and 23 assists in 149 appearances, which comes out to an average of a goal involvement every 2.70 games.

This rise has seen him earn nine senior caps for England, and his valuation soar, with Football Transfers valuing him at up to €67.5m, which is about £56m. For context, that’s a higher valuation than both Gabriel Martinelli’s (£49m) and Leandro Trossard’s (£25m) estimates via the same source.

Ultimately, it’s hard to blame Arsenal for releasing Eze when they did, as spotting talent at such a young age is notoriously difficult, but we can’t help but imagine just how brilliant he’d be in Arteta’s side.